#374: The Race to Break the 4-Minute Mile

The Art of Manliness

Society & Culture, Education, Philosophy

4.7 • 14.5K Ratings

🗓️ 25 January 2018

⏱️ 44 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

You may have heard of Roger Bannister and his amazing feat of breaking the 4-minute mile mark in 1954. But the story leading up to this milestone of human performance often gets overlooked and is filled with drama and lessons on grit, determination, and a living a balanced life. My guest today wrote a book sharing the story behind Bannister’s record and the two other men who were also vying to break it. His name is Neal Bascomb and his book is "The Perfect Mile: Three Athletes, One Goal, and Less than Four Minutes to Achieve It." We begin our discussion talking about the lead up to the race in which the 4-minute-mile barrier was broken and how many doctors in the early 20th century believed achieving this milestone was physiologically impossible. Neal then tells us about the lives of the three men racing to be the first to run a sub-4-minute mile, and shares insights from them on the way the ethos of sports has changed as it's transformed from an amateur pursuit to a professional job, as well as the ability of people to push the limits of the human body by sheer mental will.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	[♪ INTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪
0:13.9	Brett McCay here and welcome to another edition of the Art of Manliness Podcast.
0:18.1	Now, you may have heard of Roger Bannister and his amazing feet of breaking the form in
0:21.4	a mile market back in 1954.
0:23.7	But the story leading up to this milestone of human performance often gets overlooked and
0:27.3	is filled with drama and lessons on grit, determination, and living a balanced life.
0:31.8	My guest today wrote a book sharing the story behind Bannister's record and the two other
0:35.0	men who were also vying to break it.
0:36.8	His name is Neil Bascom and his book is The Perfect Mile, Three Athletes, One Goal,
0:40.5	and Less Than Four Minutes to Achieve It.
0:42.4	We begin our discussion talking about the lead up to the race in which the four-minute
0:45.3	mile barrier was broken and how many doctors in the early 20th century believed achieving
0:49.4	this milestone was physiologically impossible.
0:51.9	Neil then tells about the lies of the three men racing to be the first to run a sub-four-minute
0:55.6	mile and shares insights from them on the way the ethos of sports changed as it transformed
1:00.0	from amateur pursuit to professional job, as well as the ability of people to push the
1:03.8	limits of the human body by sheer mental will.
1:06.3	Really great show after the show is over, check out the show notes at a-wim.is-s-lash-perfect-mile.
1:10.5	Neil Bascom, welcome to the show.
1:26.5	Thank you for having me.
1:27.7	So you spent a lot of your career writing books about war, specifically World War II, and
1:33.1	your book The Perfect Mile.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Art of Manliness, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of The Art of Manliness and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.